Bats
by Lesalanna
Summary: A Batman-Golden Compass/Northern Lights crossover. How would things be different if everyone had dæmons? A series of connected short-fics/drabbles set, as of now, during Batman Begins.
1. The First Batcave

**((**Attack of the plotbunny. My take on a crossover between _Batman_ and _The Golden Compass/Northern Lights_, known collectively as the _His Dark Materials_ series. Basically, what would things be like if everyone had dæmons. Dæmons are for all intents and purposes, one's soul or concience, manifested outside the body in a corporeal (touchable) animal form. The form will change during childhood, "settling", or staying in one form when a person's personality has stablized...I don't believe in the falderall about it being your first sex act, or only when you're with your one true love. I'll stop the rant now, and say, enjoy, constructive criticism appreciated! Multiple short "chapters" have already been written, will post all I have already done as fast as I can.**))**

**The First Batcave**

It was dark down in the hole. Bruce tried not to cry out, but he was so scared. It was so dark, and, and, and-_"Shh, Bruce. We're going to be ok."_

"Are you sure, Sezja? Daddy did say to not come here, and we did, and now look!" Bruce gestured to the cavern they were in, accidentally shifting his bad leg. He screamed, and then the world grew even blacker. Blacker not with his fainting, but from a multitude of bodies, wheeling in and out and around. They were everywhere! Sezja tried to defend him, but the small dragon she changed to was ruthlessly beat down by the bats.

"Sezja, to me! Sezja!" Bruce cried as phantom bruises appeared and faded on his face and hands where his dæmon was getting hit. She relented, and shifted to a foxhound puppy to better sit in his lap. The pair cowered in the dark as the bats flew up and out, as scared of the pair as the pair were of them. Bruce ran a hand down Sezja's back, trying to calm the both of them.

"Daddy's coming, I know it. Rachel and Alfred went to get him." Bruce said, trying to be brave. The pair cringed as there was another rush of wings, but it was only a dæmon coming to settle on the floor next to them.

"_Your father and the grey-haired one are coming. Mine is up at the top, looking at you…she is worried." _The chaffinch hopped nervously from foot to foot. Craning his neck, Bruce was barely able to make out Rachel's head.

"_We are injured, but we will be fine. A broken leg, some bruises and scrapes. And a lot of stupidity." _Sezja said, ignoring Bruce's glare at the last. It was the truth, after all. A gruff, accent-tinged bark and the sound of wings again announced that the adults were there.

The peregrine took a moment to glare at the chaffinch, who fled back topside. _"We are very worried about you, what you did was very foolish. Do not do such a thing again."_

Sezja turned into a mouse and curled up tighter in Bruce's palm. _"Sorry."_

"_You are forgiven. To be young is to be foolish, after all." _The falcon flew over and gently took mouse-Sezja from Bruce's hand, bringing her out of the hole.

_Sejza! _Yes, it was only twenty or so feet, but it was still so much further than they had ever separated before.

"Bruce, it's ok, it'll be ok. Sezja can join you down here if she wishes." The gruff barking made the voice pause, and continue a bit in laughter, "Unfortunately, Cardea's…being Cardea. Sezja will probably be back down here soon. Now let's get you back up to the sun, eh, son?" Bruce looked up to see his father staring down at him. He hadn't even heard the man approach; he'd been so consumed with twinges of pain from his heart, greater pain from his leg and a fair amount of self-loathing. Bruce lifted his arms and let his father pick him up, holding him like he was a little boy. He was eight, he wasn't little anymore! At the moment he found he didn't really care. Having his Daddy hold him made everything feel better.

Those bats had been really scary.


	2. Crime Alley

**((**I don't own _Batman, The Golden Compass/Northern Lights _or the concept of dæmons, but I do own the names/forms of all dæmons seen herein.**))**

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**Crime Alley**

Bruce had been so excited to see the movie, right up until he realized they'd given Zorro a bat dæmon. And that only two of the people in seats directly around him didn't have bat dæmons. He was a little worried then. _"Don't fret, beloved, remember, they're only on screen or regular people who aren't going to hurt you."_ Sezja settled down further in his lap, her tiger cub filling his lap and giving him something large and comforting to hug. He knew that, Sezja didn't have to tell him that!

Still, he didn't like bats. Daddy and Mommy both told him how brave he had been after the movie was over. They'd all had so much fun, despite how scared Bruce had been. Once he'd been able to forget about the bat dæmon, the movie had been amazing. And now they were gonna go get ice-cream!

Then, all of a sudden, Bruce couldn't move. He couldn't move…he couldn't breathe. Something was wrong. Something was really, really wrong. Sezja had been just a bit in front of them, as a starling. Now he couldn't see her… "Se-" he choked out. "Da-"

His father looked at him from where the boy had been walking between his parents. "Bruce!" The welcoming, happy look on his father's face turned to alarm as he reached over to catch his son, Patria mantling in fear at the sight of hers' son. Bruce was quickly settled on the ground as his father began trying to check why he was barely breathing. His mother smoothed back his hair, trying to keep him calm, forgetting about her pretty dress to kneel in the mud, his head on her lap. Patria and Ikiaran took off as one, trying to find the family's littlest dæmon.

Bruce was slowly turning blue, but nothing his father could do would restore color, and Thomas was loathe to leave his wife and child like this, even to find a phone. He knew it was connected to Sezja. The sooner she was found, the better Bruce would be. Faster than expected, the peregrine and hound were back, taking their accustomed places with their humans.

_"She's…she's coming."_ Thomas didn't understand Patria's comment, until a bat flew out of the shadows, followed by a man. The bat held Sezja, the man a gun. His eyes were crazed as he took in the scene, lighting up with a mix of pity, fear, shame, hopelessness, anger and desperation.

"Give me all your money…and that pretty necklace, or I'll let your…little…boy…die."

Time seemed to stop. Martha clenched her hands on Bruce's shoulders as the boy tried to stand. His eyes were wide with fear, echoed in his rapidly shapechanging dæmon. Nothing she turned to could release the bat's hold. Thomas Wayne hadn't reacted, except for the tightening of Patria's talons on his shoulder. She and Ikiaran could take the bat...but then her human spoke.

"That's fine, take it easy." Thomas murmured the phrase like a mantra as he reached into his pocket and took out his wallet, throwing it at the mugger's feet. Martha slowly got up, coming to stand beside her husband, keeping Bruce where he was with a look. The bat released its grip on Sezja slightly, allowing him to breathe easy enough to stand. He came up to stand beside his mother. She swiftly tucked him behind her, Thomas taking a step forward to block both his wife and child.

"There's your money, now please…let my son's dæmon go." With those words, Sezja was released, flying like a bullet from the man's gun over to Bruce, her robin morphing to a spider monkey to better cling to him.

"The necklace," The mugger said, "give me the necklace." Martha turned horrified eyes to her husband. It was her anniversary gift from him, but he nodded at her. With shaking hands, she began to slowly try to undo the clasp. "That's fine, just take it and go."

"Faster!" Unexpectedly, the bat winged down, ready to seize the necklace. Patria lunged for the bat as her human did the same for the man. Gunshots. Screaming.

Thomas Wayne slumped to the ground, abdomen and chest already stained with blood, his wife and child's screams ringing in his ears. He could only watching, coughing blood as the mugger stalked over, ripping the pearls from his still screaming wife's neck. More gunshots. Silence, except for running feet.

"Mommy? D-Daddy?" The treble of a voice he never expected to hear again. "D-Daddy? M-Mommy's not breathing." Bruce crawled over to his father, one arm wrapped around Sezja, the other clenched in a tight fist.

"Bruce…" Thomas gasped, it was getting hard to breathe, let alone talk. "It'll be okay."

"But Daddy, I can't see Ikiaran anywhere, and…Patria's…fading. Daddy…Daddy, I'm scared."

"Don't be…afraid…" Thomas smiled, or tried to. At least Martha's death had been quick. He could see her waiting for him. "We…love…"

"I love you, Daddy. Daddy?" Bruce shook his father's shoulder. The man didn't respond…he wasn't breathing. "Daddy? _Daddy!_"

_"Bruce…"_ Sezja couldn't say it, _"beloved, they're…they're gone."_

"No, Sezja, they can't be, we were gonna go get ice-cream. No, Sezja, no, no, _no, no, NO!_" Bruce's grief-stricken howl was followed by Sezja's roar as his dæmon followed suit.

That was how Officers Ramirez and Gordon found them, spending their grief to the sky, Bruce under the sheltering form of his griffin dæmon, one hand holding his father's rapidly cooling one, the other still clenched in a fist.


	3. Kind Wolf

_Disclaimer: see second chapter!_

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**Kind Wolf**

James Gordon didn't look up from where he'd been staring blindly at the official report he was supposed to be filling out. He hadn't even picked up the pen yet. Aasimah growled briefly, causing him to absentmindedly stroke a hand down her head. "It's ok, Aasi. We'll catch that bastard."

He still couldn't believe Martha and Thomas Wayne were dead. Dead! They had been the lifeblood of the people of Gotham. They had _cared_. Slowly, Gotham had been struggling her way out of the hellhole she had fallen into…now her saviors were gone. What could they do? _"We can protect their cub, Jim. That's all we can do. That's what we do. We protect."_ Jim had to give a quiet, harsh laugh at that. We protect. Ha!

Like half the force wasn't corrupt already. Like-a softly cleared throat finally made him look up.

The man in front of him was tall, that much was certain. A shock of white hair covered his head, and dotted the muzzle of the inky black Scottish terrier-dæmon beside him. The man looked haggard, like he was in the middle of a nightmare and just wanted to wake up. Jim had a sinking feeling he was just about to make the man's nightmare worse. "Sir?"

"I am here to collect Master Bruce. He is traumatized, and I would like to get him home." The clipped British tone didn't entirely hide the strain and grief in the voice, but if Jim hadn't been listening for it, he wouldn't have noticed.

"Alfred Pennyworth, I presume?" Jim stood to shake the older man's hand. The butler, if he remembered correctly, and named as one of Bruce Wayne's guardians.

"Yes. Officer Gordon, where is Master Bruce?"

"We placed him in Interrogation Room One," Jim said, inwardly wincing at the straightening of Pennyworth's shoulders, that wasn't a good sign, "We took a couch in there for him to rest on, it was only because we have a number of officers who have bat dæmons, and he reacted badly to seeing them. I questioned him myself, briefly. Last I knew, he had been brought a hot chocolate and some cookies." As Jim continued to talk, the butler's shoulders relaxed slightly. Jim didn't have the heart to mention that he had been the one to order all of that done, despite his low rank on the force. It would just upset the other man more.

The last thing they needed was for Pennyworth to have a heart attack on top of everything else.

Jim still couldn't get the image out of his mind.

_The little boy sat there, sobbing his heart out, protected by a direwolf-dæmon who was howling her grief to the sky in echo. Ramirez's Cinese flew up to talk to the direwolf, but the minute the fruit-bat's flapping began to echo down the alley, the direwolf changed to a dragon, bellowing flame towards the sound. Cinese barely avoided being seriously burnt, instead coming away with a light singe._

_"Shit," Ramirez muttered even as Cinese sped back to her, the pair now smelling of smoke, "Jim, you try to talk to him. I'll go call for backup and the ME." Jim merely nodded as she turned back the way they had come, ready to radio in their situation. He could barely see the bodies now tucked behind the dragon, who fanned he wings protectively over the family._

_"Hey, so-sweetheart-" Jim hoped he hadn't made anything worse by using such a "girlie" nickname to the boy, but he had figured taking Aasimah's suggestion not to call him son was a good one, just in case this was what it seemed like. "I'm a police officer, I'm not going to hurt you, I just want to come over and see if you're ok, alright?"_

_"No…" the boy's voice was weak and raspy, it seemed like he hadn't even heard Jim at all, "no, no, no…no…Mommy…Daddy…no…" The dragon-dæmon looked at the pair, before saying, _"My Bruce needs you, Officer…his p-parents were just murdered. I am Sezja." _ Aasimah looked at him, and the two slowly trawled through their memories. Where had they heard the names Bruce and Sezja together? Then it dawned on them in unison. That piece on the charity fair hosted by the Waynes…their son was Bruce, his dæmon Sezja. Oh, God._

_"Bruce? Bruce Wayne? This is Officer James Gordon of the Gotham PD." Bruce turned, and Jim saw his little face was ravaged from crying. "M-Mommy and D-Daddy are-are-are dead…a bad man with a bat dæmon killed them." Jim had to resist his first instinct, a wave of paternal feelings. Just because he was barely out of high-school himself didn't mean he couldn't have the feelings. If the bo-Bruce Wayne was a witness, he couldn't scoop him up in a hug and tell him everything was alright. Besides, the boy looked too old to willingly take that from a stranger. That was until he realized he had the child wrapped around his waist like a secondary belt, his dæmon clinging to Aasimah like she would never let go of the wolf._

Jim looked up to see they had made it to Interrogation One, and Pennyworth was inside, holding onto Bruce Wayne like he was the last life-line the older man had to sanity. Bruce did the same, tears streaming down his face again, hot chocolate dripping off the table where he had dropped it in his haste to get to his butler.

Jim sighed, turning away from the sight, hand once again mindlessly stroking Aasimah for comfort. What a day…God, what a day.


	4. Overseas Settling

_Disclaimer: see second chapter_

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**Overseas Settling**

_"Thank God, we're home."_ Sezja's grumble made Bruce laugh and rub at his stubble. He'd have to see if Alfred had a razor handy…then again, Alfred always had everything, so of course he would have a razor handy.

_"And what did we learn on this trip?"_ "Well…" Bruce sat back, ignoring the grime he was getting on the seat-it was his plane, after all.

_Rachel slapping him for trying planning to shoot his parent's murderer; then that reporter took the shot herself…Confronting the mob-boss and getting beaten…Giving his coat to the poor man on the street, the man's haggard hound-dæmon reminding him of Mother…He tried to ignore Sezja's warnings as he boarded the plane, heading nowhere in particular, just-_away_…He could only sit there staring at the police officer who accused him of stealing. Ok, technically he was, but technically, _he _owned the company, now didn't he? Of course, he wasn't believed…The fight with the prisoner in jail, "You are in hell, little man, and I am the devil!" Bruce smirked at Sezja, responding, "You're not the devil, you're practice."…Getting put in solitary confinement for the _other_ prisoners' protection…Meeting Henri Ducard…Ra's al Ghul and training…_

_…The tundra was windswept, the ice slick. Yet the pair still fought like mad with swords, dæmons attacking each other with the same ferocity as their humans. Ducard's eyes glinted in the harsh light. The man was up to something. "Your father's death was not your fault." Sezja roared in agreement, leonine form leaping over the man's ermine, but she stopped, cowed and angered at his next statement, "It was your father's." There was nothing she could say to stop Bruce's furious attack, if it hadn't been for the Taboo, she would have done it herself. She barely heard the rest of the conversation, she was so overcome with rage, and busy fighting off a suddenly chimera formed Gahulra. Thomas _had_ acted, damnit, but it hadn't been enough! That was the day, fueled by anger, channeled by shame, that she began to stay in one shape…_

_…Ducard gave another tidbit of advice, "Your compassion is a weakness your enemies will not share." Bruce had merely given a small smile, proud for once in the time they were here, "That's why it's so important. It separates us from them." Sezja purred in approval, his mother always said it was better to be compassionate than cruel, more bees with honey and all…_

_…The palace burned around them as Bruce dragged Ducard behind him, Sejza awkwardly pulling Gahulra from the incinerating mountain-top retreat. Even while muttering swears at her human for his foolhardiness, Sezja grew only happier at his resolve to not kill, regardless of what the man had done. Yes, her jaguar form was perhaps a bit cold for the snow outside, but well, South America had mountains too, and besides, she liked it!_

"We settled, Sez, in more ways than one." He ran a hand down her equally dirty spotted hide, idly tracing the rosettes dotting the golden backing. _"That we did, beloved. I do wonder how everything's gone without us…Gotham may be quite different from how we left it."_ Bruce did not respond, standing instead to walk down the stairs, trying to hide his limp until she came up beside him, bracing his bad leg.

Alfred was there, waiting, like they had expected. Cardea hadn't changed much, her little red plaid coat the only bright thing on the aging pair. "You look very fashionable," Alfred told him, but Bruce could see the mirth lurking in his eyes, and read it in the twitching of the Scottie's muzzle, "Apart from the mud." Bruce grinned openly as Sezja ran forward to nuzzle Cardea.

Everything was settled, now, or mostly.

**((**For my reasons for making Bruce settle to what animal he did, please go check out http:// daemonpage [DOT] com/ analysis8 [DOT] php#jaguar **))**


	5. Business Dealings

_Disclaimer: see second chapter_

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**Business Dealings**

Bruce sat down to his first solid English breakfast in seven years, consuming the eggs and rasher of bacon with gusto. Sejza looked up from her platter of sausages and shook her head at him.

_"You're going to be wired, that's already your fourth cup of coffee."_

"No, it's my second, the first two were _chai_."

_"Right, like _chai _doesn't have caffeine. Either way, eat up, we've got a lot to do today."_ Bruce snorted into his coffee at her tone, it sounded so much like Cardea's stuffy British accent, he had to wonder if she'd been taking lessons. Alfred walked in carrying his own breakfast, the older man had convinced Bruce to use the dining room for his meal, but he hadn't been able to come up with a suitable argument as to why he himself could not eat with his employer.

"Master Wayne-" the British man stopped at the glare he was given, "Master Bruce-Bruce." He let out an audible sigh as the glare stopped. How undecorous, calling his employer by his first name without an honorific! Alfred Pennyworth was nothing if not an impeccable English butler, the need for titles included.

"You've been gone a long time, _sir_." It was Bruce's turn to sigh now at Alfred's deliberate stressing of the last word. It looked like his attempt was in vain after all.

"What of it, _Mr. Pennyworth_? Have you told anyone I was coming back?"

Cardea let out a groan for her human at Bruce's tone. So that was how it was going to be. Oh, this could be interesting. The female dæmons shared a glance that seemed to express that phrase common among females no matter what distinction put to separate them, a phrase always started with a sigh. _"Men!"_

"No, Master Bruce, I just couldn't figure out the legal ramifications of bringing you back from the dead." Alfred suddenly wished he had a camera, the expression on his employer's face was blackmail material, should he ever need it…little did he know the amount of blackmail material he would be introduced to soon. The picture would be chump-change in comparison to what he would get later, if the thought had ever occurred to him. Which, being Alfred Pennyworth, it did not.

Sezja performed the spit-take for her human, swinging her head up to stare at Cardea in shock, much as her human was doing for the Scottie terrier's. _Dead?!_ "Dead?" Bruce's tone was much more mild than the way it had been in his head, that much was for certain.

"You've been gone seven years."

Bruce had a moment of irrational anger that showed when he next spoke; his temper had always been sharp, and his time away had not fully tempered it. "You had me declared _dead_?"

"Oh," Alfred coughed, taking a bite of his melon, "actually it was Mr. Earle, he's taking the company public. He wanted to liquidate your majority shareholding. Those shares are worth quite a bit of money."

Bruce had to crack a grin at this, already plotting his next plan of attack. It would only slightly tweak his original idea of reintroduction to society, this new information. "Well, it's a good thing I left everything to you, then."

Alfred had to return the smile, "Quite so, sir. And you can borrow the Rolls if you like. Just bring it back with a full tank of gas."

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That was how Bruce found himself facing the immaculate desk of Earle's secretary. Sezja grumbled to herself about basic human decency, since she considered that no one had the right to be forced to be that neat. Bruce didn't bother to tell her some people liked it better that way. He himself preferred the "clean but lived in" look.

"Good morning, I'm here to see Mr. Earle." The secretary didn't even bother to look up from her desk, "busy" painting her nails. "Name?"

"Uh…" Bruce shared a look with Sezja; she began muttering about incompetent, flighty song-bird souls. "Bruce Wayne." The secretary's quick look up and subsequent spilled bottle of nail-polish made Sezja shake with stifled laughter. Things had just gotten interesting.

Paul Earle walked out of his office, a frown marring his otherwise self-considered rugged good looks. The damn phone had been ringing for ten minutes straight, why hadn't Jessica picked it up? He was busy trying to arrange a way to get that dead man, Bruce Wayne's shares out from the bitter thumb of the man's old crotchety butler, but the lawyers told him everything was iron clad. Fiddlesticks, there had to be something!

"Jessica, where are you?" He stopped, staring at his secretary's wood-thrush dæmon, who was busy grooming a jaguar, of all creatures. "Why is no one answering the phone?"

Bruce kept his voice low and steady, his hands wrapped around the secretary's-Jessica's-smaller ones. "That's it, keep your eye on the ball, and…" he shifted her hands with his and her hips with his. Golf had always been the game that Princeton boys took dates they wanted to get close to easy; they'd always picked the cute but stupid ones, who couldn't figure out how to swing for the life of them. Bruce was just glad he'd remembered what he'd gotten from watching his friends. The ball sunk easily in the hole on the miniature putting green spread across the office floor. It was only when the ball was in and he had heard her giggle in pleasure, then stiffen at her boss' voice that he let go with a small smile to reassure her.

"It's Wayne Enterprises, Mr. Earle, I'm sure they'll call back." He made sure to inflect his voice with all the joviality and devil-may-care attitude he could, in hopes that this, among things, would throw the older man off guard. The slight stagger from Earle made him worry momentarily about a heart attack, until he looked into the man's eyes, and saw not pain, but fear and surprise. Good, his plan was working.

"Bruce?" The man had to pause, seemingly to collect his thoughts, "You're supposed to be dead."

Bruce just smiled winningly, keeping the sarcasm light. "I'm sorry to disappoint."

Sezja took this moment to stand up, leisurely stretching before walking over to Bruce's side. _"The rumors of our death were greatly exaggerated."_ She smirked as well as a cat could, baring a long, deadly canine as she inwardly sniggered.


End file.
